Shaggy manes are North American and European natives. They are also common in Australia,
New Zealand, and Iceland, but they were probably introduced to these locations. The ones shown here pop up in my lawn from time to time.

Identification: Caps are 1-2" (2.5-5 cm) around, egg-shaped
or even cylindrical
at first, spreading to become more disk-shaped and up to 3" (7.9 cm) wide. Younger caps
have odd-looking hairy scales that I have not seen on other mushrooms, the reason for the common
names “shaggy mane” and “lawyer’s wig.” Caps are mostly white, but some of the scales are brownish.
As the cap spreads out into a parasol, it becomes brownish. Eventually the mushroom self-destructs
(technically, “deliquesces”)—dissolving
itself into an inky black slime with enzymes. Stalks of these fragile mushrooms are 3-12" (7.6-30 cm) tall and up to 1" (2.5 cm) in
diameter. Gills are very closely spaced, white, becoming pinkish. The spore print is black.

Edibility: Shaggy manes are delicious, delicately flavored, well known among
mushroom foragers, and hard to confuse with other mushrooms. Young caps taste best, and may be
halved and dipped in egg batter, coated with bread crumbs, and sautéed. But these don’t keep because
of their built-in self-destruct feature, so use them as soon as you pick them. Some members of
Coprinus cause gastric discomfort if consumed with alcohol. Reports vary about whether
this is true for shaggy manes. Some accounts claim that consuming alcohol even a day or two later
can effect you; others that there is no effect. Sautéing in wine is apparently safe.

Roughly 75 people in North America are poisoned each year by mushrooms, often from eating a poisonous species that resembles an edible species. Though deaths are rare, there is no cure short of a liver transplant for severe poisoning. Don’t eat any mushroom unless you are absolutely certain of its identity! Please don’t trust the identifications on this site. We aren’t mushroom experts and we haven’t focused on safely identifying edible species.